Many Happy Returns to Tesco
by Iwantthatcoat
Summary: It's Mrs. Hudson's birthday, and Sherlock *will* bake a cake. After all, it's basically chemistry, right? A gift to a Nonnie who tried and tried to make a cake for her mum's birthday. "One of luminol's chief ingredients is Na2CO3, sodium carbonate, better known as baking powder, close in composition to lye, and particularly good for pretzels, and known as jian..."
1. Chemistry!

"You... do know it's Mrs. Hudson's birthday today, yes?"

"Mmm," came the response from behind a jumble of test tubes and Erlenmeyer flasks in the kitchen.

"I thought not. Well, since there's no chance of making one with the kitchen is this state, I'll go grab a cake on the way home. Be nice to do something for her."

"Nonsense. I'll bake her one. She would appreciate something made by hand far more."

"You. Will bake a cake?"

"Was I unclear? Yes, John. I, Sherlock Holmes, the world's only consulting detective, will bake a birthday cake for our long-suffering landlady and non-housekeeper (though the lack of dust on my bookshelf most certainly would suggest otherwise), Mrs. Hudson."

"She will want to actually eat it, you realize. You know how to bake?"

Sherlock held up one flask. "This is luminol, or rather, it will be shortly...a chemical which you have, no doubt, seen at crime scenes where traces of blood might otherwise be undetectable. It can even, theoretically, detect blood on washed clothing. One major drawback is it will also create its characteristic blue glow when it makes contact with copper, and, unfortunately, bleach. So, if the criminal cleaned up after himself, or an overly enthusiastic housekeeper cleaned up _for_ him, with bleach product, the whole room would react, and this particular chemical would be rendered useless. I am endeavoring to make it less reactive to that particular agent. One of luminol's chief ingredients is Na2CO3, sodium carbonate, better known as _baking_ _powder_, close in composition to lye, and particularly good for pretzels, and known as jian when making especially slippery Chinese noodles. Replace a sodium with a hydrogen and you've got baking _soda_. These chemicals make cake rise because the heat of the oven deconstructs the molecule to create sodium carbonate, carbon dioxide and water vapor. It's the carbon dioxide gas which makes the tiny bubbles that, in turn, make your cake _fluffy_ and light. As opposed to a variation of a death frisbee. See," he made a short wave from his wrist, "Chemistry!"

John stared for a moment, unsure how to react. "Measuring cups are in the bottom drawer to the left of the sink. Have at it. Don't blow anything up."

"Mmm." Sherlock returned to his solution of almost-luminol.


	2. Simplicity Itself

It took a significant amount of self-restraint, and two (ignored) texts from John asking how it was coming along, before Sherlock finally cleared off the table, grudgingly wiped it down, and began the search for a suitable cake recipe.

He took a quick look in the fridge. Eggs, butter, milk. Good. Cupboard: flour, sugar, jam. Good. This is indeed possible without a trip to Tesco.

After a quick image search of cakes, he settled on a Victoria Sponge. Now, for the recipe. "Mary Berry's perfect Victoria sandwich." It even had a corresponding YouTube link: 40,580 views, 436 likes, 12 dislikes. Reasonable statistics, given people's natural tendency to simply move on after the mission was accomplished, hesitant to log in and leave feedback after a successful experience.

Sherlock removed the eggs, butter and milk from the fridge and placed them on the table. The milk seemed awfully light. "None. No milk. Do I need milk? No, I don't need milk. Good,"shot off in quickfire speech, then "We need milk!" announced to the empty flat. He turned his attention back to the recipient in screen. **Four free-range eggs. **Free range is hardly necessary. He eyed the recipe with a newfound skepticism. Four eggs it is. **225 g self-raising flour**. Yes, we have flour. **2 tsp baking powder. 225 g baking spread, margarine or soft butter at room temperature. Extra to grease the tins.**Yes. **To serve: good-quality strawberry or raspberry jam.** Yes. Mrs. Hudson's favorite brand, given to John as a thank you gift for caring for her plants while she spent the week at her sister's. **Whipped double cream (optional). **Optional indeed.

Five ingredients. Simplicity itself. **Preparation time: less than 30 minutes. Cooking time: 10-30 minutes. **In less than an hour he would be back to his experiments.

**Preheat oven to 180. Grease and line 2x20 cm sandwich tins**. Do we have tins? After a rather exhaustive search of the cupboards there were some tins of roughly the correct size and shape . Sherlock didn't know how they got there and decided he would cease to question how or why, instead simply expressing gratitude that they were present. **Use a piece of baking or silicone paper to rub a little baking spread** (or, presumably, butter) **around the inside of the tins.** With baking or silicone paper? Surely he would have spotted something like that when he looked for the pans. He looked again. Just to spread the butter. Any thin paper would do. He had printers and printer paper scattered throughout the flat, but it wouldn't be very thin. Oh, yes. The Rizlas. He spread the butter around. Line the pan? Now that part he'd just skip. Eggs, sugar, flour, baking powder, spread. **Mix. Hand mixer or spoon. **Spoon. **Put a damp cloth under your bowl**... surely I don't need to... this is ridiculous. I'll just mix the batter. There. Mix. Mix. Mix. Where was I? Oh, **divide between the tins. You can weigh them **? Can weigh them? Of course I can weigh them. Should I weight them? Never mind. **Use a spatula.**Yes. I have a spatula. **Middle shelf. 25 minutes. **Don't open the door while they are cooking. Do look through the door to check them after 20 minutes. I have 20 minutes.

Sherlock Holmes is not entirely unaware of his tendency to become fully absorbed in something to the exclusion of all other things. That is precisely why he set a timer and, 20 minutes later, diligently peered through the door without opening it. **The cakes are done when they are golden brown and coming away from the edges**. Not yet then. He almost went off to check John's emails without resetting the timer for another five minutes, but caught himself just in time. When the alarm went off a second time, they were golden brown and separating at the edges, exactly as described. Easy peasy. **Springy to the touch**. No. No, not at all springy to the touch. **Cool. Run butter knife around the edge and out on a ...cooling rack**? Where is a cooling rack? What is a cooling rack? Oh. Forget the bit about using a tea towel to prevent rack marks, where is a bloody cooling rack? There was no chance of leaving wire impressions on the cakes anyway. They were hard as a rock.


	3. Video

Video. I'll watch the video and see what went wrong. Even she says it couldn't be any easier. Eggs, caster sugar (different), baking powder, self-raising? Self-raising flour in a _sifter_? Mixer. Don't overbeat...did I overbeat?...maybe I overbeat. 25 minutes, not 20, and there's the cooling rack. I need a cooling rack. She didn't use paper. Do I still need paper?

Sherlock did another inventory, and was off to Tesco for caster sugar, self-raising flour, a sifter, a mixer, two perfectly sized pans and a cooling rack. And the optional cream. It was about this time when John texted again.

_How's it going? - J_

_Fine. -S_

_Fine? -J_

_Fine. - S_

After watching the video two more times, he paused it as he completed each step. He sifted the flour. He didn't overmix it. He weighed the batter into two equal portions using his balance (even though it was the original recipe that suggested that, not the video). He baked it again, pulled his chair up to the oven and watched through the oven door as it cooked for the entire 25 minutes. There was no way it wouldn't be done right this time.

And yet... it made a better weapon than a cake. It might make a splendid murder weapon for Mary Berry.

[Thumbs down.] What the hell was my sign in name anyway? Did I ever even have one? [Cancel].


	4. Tesco

No text from Sherlock bragging about his cake. This was not a good sign.

John was coming up on his last patient of the day, and was considering a quick stop-off to get one. Probably Sherlock was wrapped up in an experiment and hadn't gotten around to it. Another "friendly reminder text" would risk a tremendous strop, and he was pushing it as it was. He'd get a back-up cake. Just in case. Mrs. H had been so good to them, particularly after his latest spat with Harry when she had let him talk out quite a few things, and he couldn't stand the thought of her having nothing from them at all.

After he'd finished up, he stopped by Tesco on the way home. No sooner had he walked in the door then a striking, unmistakable figure in a long black coat at the self-checkout caught his eye... apparently calculating just how rough one could be with a carton of eggs without breaking them. Just eggs. John turned quickly and headed to a second entrance before he could be seen.

Sherlock was clearly furious. And John knew they had eggs at the flat..nearly a full dozen. He'd had one with breakfast this morning. Which meant... he had gone through them all. So he _had_ been baking. Unsuccessfully. Best to get that back-up cake then, since Sherlock's was likely inedible. And keep it out of sight, just in case he does get it right on this last try? He bought one and headed to Criterion for some coffee, and to wait it out a bit.


	5. Magniloquent Pile of Leaven

The last cake was no better than the first two. He had chosen the best two of the six cakes he had made, plopped one on top of the other, and got a certain perverse satisfaction out of decorating it anyway.

It was a stealth weapon at least, resembling a perfectly suitable cake, so long as no one looked too closely, or attempted to cut it. Or noticed the dripping jam because he was too frustrated and impatient to let it cool off properly. And the whipped cream hadn't exactly whipped. Well, the first batch had, and he was so pleased it was actually working that he kept at it a bit too long and now it was well into the butter stage. The second batch was under-whipped and slowly melting into the not-quite-cooled cake. Who was he kidding, it was a horrible cake by any criteria.

Sherlock was past the point of caring, and collapsed on the sofa with a dramatic sigh. John would be home any minute. He'd let him down. Empty-headed people all over the country could do this simple task. He could measure, he could follow directions, but... he glared at the offending confection. It was almost as if it was mocking him. Insufferable amuse-bouche. Sanctimonious cupcake. "Oh, do shut up, you magniloquent pile of leaven."


	6. I Am Serious, and Don't Call Me Sherly

John came in shortly thereafter, having left the back-up cake in a plastic bag on the landing outside. Sherlock was still lying on the sofa, glaring at the entire kitchen, as if the room was to be held responsible for his failure.

"I take it is was not a success."

"Well observed."

"I'm sure it will be fine. It's the thought that counts."

"You haven't seen it yet, John."

"Surely, it can't be that bad."

"It certainly can be. And I'm not in the mood for your silly movie quote game. Not when I've made what is quite possibly the worst cake of all time."

"That would have been 'surely you can't be serious,' and, if it Iis /I that bad, it's kind of an honor, isn't it?" he joked. "Come on. As long as we have something to give her. So what if it's not up to your usual standards of perfection. It's still cake." He went into the kitchen. Sure, it looked a bit unkempt, but some of the best cakes he had ever had were kind of messy looking. Just because Sherlock was always so fastidious didn't mean his cake would also have to look like it was just ripped out from the pages of Cake GQ. He grabbed it and headed towards the door. "Come on! Let's go!"

Sherlock scrambled up and tried to block the door, but John had the advantage of not having spent the last half hour moping on the sofa and was quicker on his feet. John had already called out "Mrs. Hudson! We have a little something for you!"

"Oh boys, you shouldn't have!" came the response.

She opened the door quickly and John transferred the cake into her hands before Sherlock could attempt to trip him or perform any other acts of sabotage. "Happy birthday, Mrs Hudson!"

"Did you make this yourselves?"

"Sherlock did. It's a bit messy, but I'm sure..."

"John bought a cake. It's outside. I'll go get it." Sherlock interrupted.

"Nonsense! Now don't be embarrassed, Sherlock. I know it's hard when you do everything so well, to not have it look just right, but it's Ifine/I.

Mrs Hudson got a triangular serving knife out from a drawer and cut the cake...or rather, attempted to cut the cake. The knife simply wouldn't pierce it. "Just a minute, I need a sharper knife..."

John looked at Sherlock and whispered "I thought you made another one?"

"I did," he replied ."I made three. This was the best of the bunch."

With an acuity of hearing far greater than her 78 years might suggest, she returned with a small paring knife and addressed Sherlock.

"Three times? Oh, Sherlock!" She wrapped her arms around him.

"I do not understand how my natural predisposition to stubbornness can be interpreted as a display of affection."

"Sherlock. You were at this for how many hours, to make three cakes?"

"Six, technically... two layers," he pouted.

"Six cakes! And I'm sure you were doing something else far more up your alley before then. "

"He was doing an experiment when I left," volunteered John.

"Exactly. And you chose to stop that to do this for me. Three times." She planted a kiss on his cheek. "Thank you."

With that, she stabbed the cake and broke off a piece."I think we might appreciate this better," she said, "if we reclassified it as a biscuit."

It was delicious.


End file.
